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El Al reported a 60 percent fall in net profit for the 3rd quarter of the year.  Profits totaled $12.3 million, this compared to $31 million in the corresponding period last year.  Revenues in the quarter totaled $496 million, a reduction of 18 percent on the same period last year. Haim Romano:”Profit was achieved despite the fall in revenue from premium class passengers and the collapse in the global cargo market.

El Al’s 3rd quarter financial reports showed a fall in net profit and in revenue mainly as a result of a reduction in yield caused by a reduction in average revenue per passenger and the rise of the U.S. Dollar in relation to the Euro. The economic recession which has caused a worldwide slowdown of air cargo, resulted in a fall of 47% in cargo revenues compared to the same quarter last year and a fall in the average price per ton of cargo.

Operating costs for the quarter totaled $400.7 million; this compared to $472.4 million for the corresponding quarter last year and represented a reduction of about 15 percent.  The reduction was mostly caused by the drop in the price of jet fuel. The company's expenditure on jet fuel dropped by $78.7 million compared to the same period last year and totaled $136 million. Jet fuel constitutes about 27.4 percent of turnover.

According to Haim Romano, El Al’s CEO, the continuation of the worldwide recession still weighs heavily on the global aviation industry, with the levels of business traffic still lower than normal. “The reality, in the face of continued growth in competition, we acted aggressively and with greater flexibility to attract the traffic and in particular to allow the business sector to continue to fly,” explained Romano.

Romano also added that the global financial crisis had led to fierce erosion in premium traffic prices and the collapse of the cargo market; this had resulted in a fall in revenues

"At a time when most of the world's airlines are reporting huge losses, El Al presents net operational profits, indicative of its ability to weather the global financial crisis which has led to a fierce erosion in premium traffic prices and the collapse of the cargo market. I shall note that for the first time since the crisis came to a head in 2008, in the 3rd quarter of the year Ben Gurion Airport listed a moderate increase of one percent in international passenger traffic. Here at El Al we present a 7% increase in the number of passengers compared to the same quarter last year. Thanks to its strategy, El Al remains the leader in the Israeli aviation market, with its market share increasing by 6% to 35%.”

Included in the quarterly report was a presentation that compared El Al’s percentage of net profit in relation to its foreign competitors.  This showed that the El Al was in third place, behind Air Canada and Lufthansa, while all of the other airlines announced losses during the quarter.